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My close friend / bike team member was out yesterday evening on his road bike training for the upcoming bike season. He had his helmet and lights on his bike. It was a road bike though. So he was up about 20minutes north of the City Of Toronto in farm land where there are many hills. It also happens to be much cooler in the farmland so there are more areas for black ice to form. Unfortunately, in the night, you cannot see the black ice at all. Well he was riding and he slipped on a patch of black ice while going down a hill and he snapped his neck the second he made contact with the ground. They said his brain stem almost completely severed from his brain (I don't remember the technical terms). He resets his clock every ride and according to his clock, his fastest speed on yesterdays trip was 62km/h. He crashed at the bottom of a hill so they said he must have crashed when he was riding down the hill as he was bruised up pretty bad. He was a close friend of mine and will be thought of by many people. My team will be going to his funeral and I'm sure many of the people that knew him will be there too. He was extremely intelligent (93% average in gr 12) and enjoyed playing guitar, and sax, and really enjoyed the sport of cycling. His name was John and he was 17 years old.

Sorry to hear about your friend and that you have to go through this at such a young age...it is never easy, if you can try to remember all the times you laughed together.. and listen carefully to friends and family at the funeral.. you may find out even more about your friend John.. than you ever thought you would.
hopefully all the kind thoughts will ease some of your burden

you know, I clicked on this thread because I thought, hmn, I wonder if someone's taking a sabbatical from the forum and is saying bye to John G.? I honestly caught my breath when I realised the real subject of the post. I don't even know you or your friend, but I'm genuinely sorry. so young ...

I suppose there're times when even though you take all the reasonable precautions and do everything right, you still have something happen to you.

I am sad and sorry. Your friend was young. That people will remember him suggests he must have lived his short life well. Remember him, remember his passions, and remember to keep living your life well, too. When we are gone we can hope people will say of us that we lived our lives well.

__________________You're east of East St. Louis
And the wind is making speeches.

One of the wonderful things about friendship is that you always have a part of your friend with you. Your shared experiences, his advice, his way of thinking. And because of that your friend John can not die, he will live always through you.

Gosh, it's really sad....... I saw this guy today, his fingers were almost all gone, only a few were left. He was serving me when I was looking around at bikes and he told me he got into an accident and was struck by the lorry. It was such a scary and freakish sight.

To die while doing something I like doesn't sound too bad but it does turn me off from competitive cycling in the future. It is something really scary. I guess that's just the risk involved in any sports.

So sorry to hear this. I know what you're going through. I lost a good friend in the beginning of February. Losing a friend is very tough. All that can be done is to think of the good times and keep your head up, move on.

First of all I would like to give you my heartfelt condolences -- it's terrible to lose such a close friend under any circumstances, but for one to be taken from you in such a sudden manner and at your young ages is especially tragic.

One idea that you might consider is to organize a ride as a memorial to your friend. See if you can get some of the local shops to chip in for sponsorship and have your club provide support (SAG, rest stops, safety, etc.) and make it an annual event in John's name and donate the proceeds to a worthy cause.

I spoke with a motorcyclist recently, who told me that the special winter tires with the steel knobs make the motocycle on ice more stable than when it is with normal tires on the asphalt.

The steel knobs puncture the ice and make the tire surface contact very strong on the ice.

I tried recently to cycle on icy road with my hybrid bike. It is way too slippery with usual summer tires. I plan to buy bicycle winter tires soon.

There is just no way to keep a reliable balance with usual summer tires on ice. I heard that the winter tires are prodced in Finlad.

Any experience with such tires? Will they be spoiled if I cycle on the cleaned areas of the road, where there is no ice, but only the asphalt surface? Or are they only for the sheer ice surface?

As for your friend - no one will get out of here alive. I hope it was the death without a prolonged suffering. Sleep well fellow cyclist.

By the way, it still could be a collision with a runaway car. In principle if the ice surface is even, and one does not make a turn, the bicycle is stable enough on the ice. Instability shows only when there is a pothole or a turn.

I would not jump to conclusions and would ask people around. Maybe there is a witness who saw something.

You can best serve your friend's memory by providing mutual emotional support to his parents and his (probably numerous) other friends. Losing a child is particularly difficult; I have a friend who may never get over the sudden loss of her intelligent, talented, beautiful 22-year-old daughter. I offer my sincere condolences to everyone who knew your friend. Be there for each other.